African Women's Rights & Resilience

Over the last decades, the world has witnessed a number of seminal accomplishments for women globally, yet stubborn contradictions remain for women in the Global South. In celebration of International Women’s Day, Barnard College hosts a daylong symposium to take stock of women’s rights movements in Africa. What, we ask, are the most urgent challenges that confront women and men involved in African women’s social justice movements? In a series of three panel discussions, distinguished scholars and activists—including Nobel Peace Laureate and Barnard Distinguished Fellow in Social Justice Leymah Gbowee—will address key issues for continental women’s movements, including the role of men in women’s social justice movements, the importance of intergenerational activism, and the stakes of transnational feminist engagements with the continent. Reception will follow.

Speakers include:

Hakima Abbas, political scientist, policy analyst and activist

Bisi Adeleye-Fayemi, First Lady of Ekiti State in Nigeria

Jimmie Briggs, journalist, educator, social entrepreneur, and creator of the “Man Up Campaign”

Abena Busia, chair of the department of women's and gender studies at Rutgers University, and co-director and co-editor of the groundbreaking Women Writing Africa Project

Tina Campt, professor of women’s, gender and sexuality studies and chair of the Africana studies department at Barnard College

Samuel G. Doe, senior policy adviser and team leader in the policy and planning division of the United Nations Development Programme’s Bureau for Crisis Prevention and Recovery

Simidele Dosekun, scholar, publisher and author

Leymah Gbowee, 2011 Nobel Peace Laureate and founder and current president of the Gbowee Peace Foundation

Amina Mama, professor and director of women and gender studies at UC Davis

Kennedy Odede, community organizer, and president and CEO of Shining Hope for Communities

Spectra, writer, media activist, and social commentator on a wide range of Africa, Diaspora, and Identity issues

Sylvia Tamale, founder and coordinator of the Law, Gender & Sexuality Research Project

Mohamed Yahya, project specialist at the United Nations Development Programme

Event is free and open to the public. Venue is wheelchair accessible. Co-sponsored by Gbowee Peace Foundation USA, Africana Studies, Athena Leadership Center, Barnard Center for Research on Women, Consortium for Critical Interdisciplinary Studies, and the Office of the President.